Lucy Dacus, “Forever is a Feeling.”

Forever is a Feeling is an album made by a woman in love. Lucy Dacus has always brought a disarming honesty to her music, but her fourth album brings a new lightness to her songs.

Though they’ve kept it private until now, Dacus recently confirmed that she and boygenius bandmate Julien Baker are in a committed relationship. The warmth of her affection for Baker comes across in many of these songs. Where her earlier work often referenced painful memories, Forever is a Feeling spends a lot of time living in the moment, or at least trying to.

Her last album, 2021’s Home Video, was largely electric guitar driven, but this time around Dacus’ sound is gentler and more acoustic. Sometimes it even takes a turn for the classical, with cello, harpsichord and harp. The album opens with an instrumental piece played by violinist Phoenix Rousiamanis, which sets a mellow tone for this set of songs.

Dacus worked with several of her musician friends in addition to her usual collaborators, including Bartees Strange, Melina Duterte (Jay Som) and Madison Cunningham. Guitarist and producer Blake Mills, who produced the new Japanese Breakfast album and recently played in Joni Mitchell’s band, brings a Joni-esque sound with his playing and production on songs like “Talk,” “For Keeps” and “Come Out.”

Although Lucy Dacus was already “out” as being queer, this album is the first time she has used specific lyrics indicating that her partner and the subject of her songs is a woman. This seems to add to the sense of freedom Dacus brings to these songs.

Standout track “Ankles” is simultaneously joyous and grounded. There’s the excitement of being able to truly be with someone in a way that wasn’t possible before (“I’m not gonna stop you this time, baby”) as well as the reveling in the simple pleasures of couplehood, like a partner making tea and helping with a crossword puzzle. She uses both real and synth strings to give the song an ironically dignified tone as she sings about being in a rather undignified position: “Pull me by the ankles to the edge of the bed.”

Dacus also upends expectations by casually and matter-of-factly singing over elegant piano and violin about her friends smoking pot and playing video games on “Limerence.” Her voice has a richness as well as an edge of melancholy to it as she sings, “I’m thinking about breaking your heart someday soon/ And if I do, I’ll be breaking mine too.” Some of these songs seem to pre-date her relationship with Baker, and as a result they find Dacus unhappy in a relationship or longing for someone she can’t have.

In the country-ish “Big Deal,” she sings over soft synths, acoustic guitar and brushed drumming. “We both know that it would never work,” she sings. “You’ve got your girl/ You’re gonna marry her/ And I’ll be watching in a pinstripe suit/ Sincerely happy for the both of you.”

Even when she does get the girl, Dacus can’t seem to just enjoy it and stop overthinking. “I love your body/ I love your mind/ They will change/ So will mine/ But you are/ My best guess at the future/ You are my best guess/ If I were a gambling man, and I am/ You’d be my best bet,” she declares on the breezy-sounding “Best Guess.”

Every relationship is a gamble, and even in the throes of new love, Dacus is still cognizant that change is inevitable and unpredictable.

Longtime fans may be slightly disappointed with this record, as it’s much more subdued lyrically and musically than her previous work. It definitely doesn’t sound like the boygenius record, even though bandmates Baker and Phoebe Bridgers each make an appearance to provide backing vocals. But it’s beautiful in a hushed, reverent way. She is, at turns, tentative, sweepingly romantic, hopeful and pessimistic. Dacus is still writing from an honest place, now reporting back from the front lines of one relationship ending to another beginning.

Follow Rachel Alm on Twitter at @thouzenfold, on Instagram at @thousandfold, and on Bluesky at @thousandfold.bsky.social.